


Broken Wings

by feonixfur



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angel Wings, Destiel - Freeform, Gen, M/M, Wings, dean/cas - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-22
Updated: 2016-07-22
Packaged: 2018-07-26 01:19:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,836
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7554622
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/feonixfur/pseuds/feonixfur
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Immediately post 11.23, Alpha and Omega, Cas wakes up from his banishment.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Broken Wings

Dean was dead. There wasn’t any point in denying it, because the sun was healed and the world was still turning. Cas’ world had stopped, however, and he had no idea if it would ever start again. He looked over at Sam, Dean’s last words to him echoing in his head:  
“Listen, if – when – when this works, Sam – he’s gonna be a mess. So look out for him, okay?”  
Dean had been right, Sam was breaking. Soon he would be unable to stand. There was no way Cas was going to let Dean down, he was no longer expendable – he had a job to do. Take care of Sam. Dean had passed on the commandment that had ruled his life for so long, and now Cas was going to continue the mission. First he would help Sam through his grief, no matter how long it took, and then Sam was just going to have to get used to Cas being there, because there was no way in Hell or Heaven that Cas was going to let anything happen to this man who was so loved by Dean. It didn’t matter that he was grieving; Cas would mourn Dean for an eternity, and there was nothing anyone could do to help him through.  
Cas could see that Sam was beginning to shake – from shock, it looked like – as they walked slowly down the bunker stairs. So he reached out to him saying,  
“Sam, I’m so sorry. If you want to talk… I’m here if you need anything.”  
Sam looked like he was going to respond, but they were interrupted by a blonde woman saying “Hello, hello.”  
Cas jumped in front of Sam, but too late he saw her bloody fingers as she activated the banishment sigil she had traced on the wall, and the last thing he heard was Sam screaming his name.  
Pain. Searing light. More pain. Cas hated being banished. It felt like he was being pulled apart by a million chains and then burned, atom by atom, before being rebuilt by a 2 year old using a sledgehammer. Suddenly he was whole again, and falling like a meteor into a small cow pond in the middle of a field. Dripping dank water, he climbed out of the pond, slipping a little from the algae that covered him from head to foot. Dimly he recognized that Metatron would probably make a joke about a creature called a swamp-thing, but Cas dismissed that thought with rising anger.  
“Sam… Look out for him, okay?” Dean had asked one thing of him and he had failed.  
“Have to save Sam,” he muttered, and started to run.  
“Have to go faster!” Cas said through clenched teeth, a few miles down the road.  
He considered stealing a car, but since he had never asked Dean to teach him that particular skill, he kept running. Not for the first time, Cas wished he still had full use of his wings, but they were burned down to their bones and useless. But were they useless? He couldn’t fly, but maybe he could go faster than a human running. Still running, he slowly stretched his wings as far as they could reach, grimacing at the pain as old scars ripped open and burnt feathers fell. He flapped them once and the pain brought him stumbling down to his knees.  
“Look out for Sam.” Dean’s voice propelled him to his feet and he started again, pushing through the pain to beat his wings again.  
One mile. That’s as far as he flew, if you could call it that, but it was faster than running.  
It took the rest of the day, but finally, he bounced off of the bunker’s wards and knew that he had made it. Cas was covered in blood, some from crashing into the ground instead of landing properly, but it was mostly from his wings since each subsequent use of them ripped them further apart. Feeling very weak, for an angel that is, Cas stumbled as quickly down the bunker stairs as he could without falling.  
“Look out for Sam!”  
Miraculously he made it all the way down the steps without any further hurt, and he started feverishly looking everywhere for Sam.  
“Can’t fail Dean. Promised Dean. Keep Sam Safe.” Cas kept repeating this over and over and over before he turned the corner into the War Room and saw Sam handcuffed and slumped over in a chair, blood dripping from a hastily bandaged gunshot wound in his shoulder.  
Cas felt his eyes burn with blue grace as the thought ripped through him, “If I fail Dean’s last request, I will burn the world down. What is the point of protecting this world if I can’t do the one thing he asked of me.”  
Slowly Cas walked over to Sam, his wings – unseen by the humans – dragging uselessly on the ground and leaving a broken trail of blood behind him; he no longer had the strength to fold them back. He made it to Sam and placed his hand on the wound on Sam’s shoulder, feeling his power diminish slightly as he healed Sam. Next he turned his attention to the handcuffs; thankfully, they were plain handcuffs and not the warded ones that Cas could not break. Picking the unconscious man up, Cas carried him over to the Observatory and hid him behind the giant telescope.  
“No one ever comes in here, you should be safe until you wake up,” he whispered in Sam’s ear before turning and gathering what remained of his power and striding towards the sounds of people further back in the bunker.  
He found them in the storeroom: a man in a suit and chauffeur’s hat and the blonde woman. They were going through the files and books, putting some back and others in boxes. For some reason this made Cas even angrier.  
“Those are Dean’s!” He shouted, and blasted the intruders back with a wave of fury.  
The man bounced awkwardly through a bookshelf and Cas heard his neck snap. It didn’t faze him in the least. He turned all his attention to the woman who was – to her credit – trying to stand and cut her hand for sigil work at the same time. Not that he was going to let her. Once more his eyes blazed blue and he let the full force of his rage hit her as the lights around the bunker started to spark and explode.  
“You touched his things! You hurt Sam! There is nowhere you can run; I am going to end you!” Cas started to glow as he gathered the remains of his grace for the final blow.  
Just as he was about to smite her, Sam’s voice cut through his fury:  
“Cas! Cas, Stop! I need to question her.”  
Not taking his eyes off the woman, he let his awareness grow to include Sam, and slowly he calmed down enough to think. Walking over to the blonde woman, he saw the fear in her eyes.  
“She probably has never seen an angel before,” he thought, and didn’t care. “Let her be afraid of me, it will help keep Sam safe. Dean said to take care of Sam.”  
Blue fire peering out of his eyes, he crouched over her and raised his hand to her forehead. The last thing she saw before succumbing to the sleep Cas induced was him: an angel, covered in blood, and radiating power.  
Cas watched as Sam carried the woman into the dungeon and secured her. He helped Sam carry the dead man outside and burn the body. He was working on auto pilot, nearly at the end of his strength. Once more he and Sam slowly walked down the bunker stairs, and once more he could see Sam start to shake.  
“Sam, are you ok?” Cas asked, slurring his words slightly in his exhaustion.  
“No, Cas. No, I’m not,” Sam replied, his voice catching as doubtlessly the day’s events finally started to catch up to him.  
Cas followed Sam to his room, helped him into his bed, and then turned and shut the door behind him. He leaned against the wall in the narrow hallway, next to Sam’s door, and finally let himself fall. Sliding down the wall and sitting on the floor in an ungraceful slump, his broken wings leaving blood and bone behind him. The last thing he heard was Dean’s voice in his head, just as though Dean was praying.  
Cas, you got your ears on? We’re… I’m coming home. Cas smiled, and figured it was an OK memory to hear before he passed out.  
“Cas? Cas, buddy, you gotta wake up.” It was Dean’s voice, so he must be dreaming.  
Dimly he heard Sam crying in the background, so that meant he needed to wake up.  
Sam, He’s going to be a mess, take care of him. Dean gave him a mission, and Cas was going to do it no matter the cost.  
“Have to take care of Sam,” he muttered as he started to move.  
His wings cracked as he tried to sit up straighter, and he gave an involuntary cry of pain. Strong hands grabbed his shoulders, and pulled him up into a better position.  
Cas heard a deep voice, one that he knew very well, say “It’s OK, Cas, you did it. You took care of Sammy, he is fine. Cas? Cas, wake up, I need you. I need you to be OK.”  
This wasn’t right. Dean was dead, unequivocally dead. Cas opened his eyes and saw green ones staring back at him, mere inches away, and his world froze.  
“Dean?” he asked, confused. “Dean, you are dead.”  
“No, Cas, the doctor was in, Chuck and Amara gave me a nickel and I psychologied them up and they like each other again.” Dean said this with a small smile, but there was a look of intense concern in his eyes as he looked Cas over.  
“Cas, what happened to you? Sam told me what happened here with the blonde bitch, but how did you get this hurt? Why are there bloody wing prints on the wall?”  
Cas looked around, and saw the blood, all of it his, and noticed Sam hugging a vaguely recognizable older woman in the background, and then turned back to Dean, still unsure if this was a dream or not. Raising a shaking hand up to Dean’s face, Cas touched him, feeling the warmth of the man in front of him seep into Cas’ skin.  
“Dean, I had to get to Sam. You told me to take care of him, I had to get back here. I had to, you said…”  
By now both of Cas’ hands were gripping the front of Dean’s shirt and tears were streaming down his face as he babbled, slipping into Enochian as his command of language failed. Suddenly Dean pulled Cas into his arms, holding him tightly and murmuring soothing sounds.  
“It’s OK, Cas. It’s alright, I’m here. I’m here and you did what I asked; you kept Sammy safe. Cas, it’s ok.”  
After a while Cas was able to think again, and he relaxed against Dean, drinking in the scent of the man who controlled the turning of Cas’ world. Dean kept holding him, but he shifted until their foreheads were touching, and Cas could see that Dean had been crying as well.  
“Dean, are you ok? What happened to the soul bomb?” Cas started to let his worry for Dean’s well-being take over his thoughts, like normal, and it was good. He needed normal; needed Dean.  
“Chuck defused it,” was all Dean said, his voice as tight as his grip on Cas’ shoulders.  
Cas hesitated before asking, “And Amara?”  
“Gone. Gone with Chuck,” answered Dean. “Cas, she gave me my mom. She brought her back…”  
Dean’s voice broke and his head slipped down to Cas’ shoulder for a moment, and Cas glanced back at the woman Sam was still holding, even though they were both watching the two men on the floor. Cas didn’t care, and turned his attention back to Dean.  
“Dean, she gave you back to us, to me…” he couldn’t finish because the words wouldn’t come. He had no reference point for the emotions he was experiencing, and he felt lost.  
Dean looked at him then, grabbed Cas’ face and kissed him, slowly, deeply, before breaking off and standing up in shock at what he had just done. Cas was up even faster, his broken wings momentarily forgotten, as he kissed Dean back. For a single moment - that lasted for an eternity - it was just the two of them. Cas felt as though they were melting into each other, until Dean’s hand brushed against his broken wing, and the pain of it brought Cas down to his knees with a cry.  
“Cas! Cas, what’s wrong?”  
The worry in Dean’s voice cut through some of the pain Cas felt. He was about to answer when he felt his father’s hands on his back. Chuck wasn’t there, but he was doing something, nonetheless. There was a burning fire, one that was spreading across his broken, bloody wings, and one that apparently the humans could see as well. Cas shoved Dean away from him, there was no way he would risk Dean’s safety, and he screamed as the fire started to consume his body.  
“Cas!” shouted Dean, above the roar of the flames.  
Cas could feel his grace start to increase and rise inside him, and he could tell it was starting to spill out as the hallway brightened to a painful degree.  
“Shut your eyes!” he yelled, before the light exploded all around them.  
Cas felt renewed. In fact, he felt stronger than he had ever been in his entire existence. He looked around and saw that time had stopped, and his father was standing in front of him.  
“Hey Castiel,” Chuck said cheerfully, drinking from a mug that said ‘world’s best dad’ on it.  
“Father? What is happening?” Cas asked. “My wings are burning still, yet they are not hurting anymore. Is this your doing?”  
Chuck looked over Cas, and nodded. He then glanced at Dean’s frozen face and smirked.  
“Yeah, that was me. Also, it’s about time you two hooked up, 7 years is too long to slow-cook love. Anyways, I amped you up a bit because I’m giving you a new mission. I need you to keep these boys safe. Dean doesn’t realize it yet, but when I told him the world would be fine because he was in it, that I made him its new guardian. And you are his. No more questions of whom you serve, Castiel, for it is neither Heaven nor Earth, but me. Can you do this?”  
Chuck was deadly serious as he said this, but Cas never once hesitated with his answer.  
“Yes, Father. I will watch over Dean and Sam, and help them with their new mission.”  
Chuck grinned. “That’s my boy!” he smiled, and disappeared.  
“Cas!” Dean was shaking the angel, and Cas realized that time had caught up to itself once again.  
“Cas, what happened? Are you OK? Cas, why are your wings on fire!” Dean was frantically checking Cas over until Cas took hold of Dean’s hands and stilled them in his own.  
“I’m fine, Dean. You can see my wings?”  
“Yes, Cas. Dammit! What happened? You were screaming and there was fire and grace, and I couldn’t get to you.” Dean’s voice was raw, and Cas could see that Dean was nearing the end of his emotional control; unsurprising, given the past couple of days.  
“God healed me and gave me new wings. He gave me a new mission, too.”  
Dean’s face had relaxed when Cas had said he was healed, but it fell when Cas mentioned the new mission.  
“Does this mean you have to go back to Heaven, Cas?” Dean asked with sorrow in his voice, and he started to step back.  
Cas could see Dean was putting up walls to guard against his emotions, so he stepped into Dean’s personal space and looked deep into those emerald eyes.  
“Dean, I am not returning to Heaven. My mission is you.”  
Dean looked at him with a face full of hope as he asked, “Does that mean you are staying?”  
Cas smiled the small, half smiled that he reserved for Dean and said, “Yes.”  
Dean held Cas’ hand as they finally turned and walked towards the others waiting at the end of the hall, and Cas folded his new wings behind him and out of sight once more. Sam was looking at them with a mix of astonishment and joy, and Mary, who was looking profoundly confused but happy.  
“Mom,” Dean said, “Mom this is my angel…”  
He broke off to glare at Sam as Sam started to laugh quietly, but kindly.  
“Mary Winchester,” said Cas, “My name is Castiel, and I’ve been watching over your son.”


End file.
